MSc Thesis Work “Fatigue aspects of electrical steel”

Placering
Västerås

MSc Thesis Work “Fatigue aspects of electrical steel”
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This position reports to
R&D Team Lead

Your role and responsibilities
You will be part of Materials Technology & Energy Storage team at ABB Corporate Research in Västerås, Sweden. At Corporate Research we lead the innovation within ABB and our task is to ensure ABB's technology competitiveness now and in the future. We work in close collaboration with other research centers, our business areas: Motion, Process Automation, Robotics & Discrete Automation and Electrification, as well academic and industrial partners. In our creative and highly skilled team we develop, design, build and test new concepts and prototypes of physical and digital powertrains consisting of electric energy source, electrical motor, electric drive, and a selected application. Electric motors are found in many applications, from water pumping to goods and personnel transportation. The need for further electrification of industry and transportation will certainly lead to the number of electric motors to increase significantly over the coming years and decades. Motor manufacturers are constantly striving to improve the products that are offered on the market, e.g. reducing materials used, improving conversion efficiency, and designing considering converter effects. The constant push for improvements together with developments in simulation methods, computational power, and experimental methods allows for new aspects to be considered in the development process. One such aspect to be explored further is the fatigue and crack growth properties of the electrical steel used as the magnetic flux guide in the rotor and stator. Previous works have shown that fatigue of the electrical steel is influenced by the shaping process as well as the microstructure developed during heat treatment. The fatigue performance partly defines the machine design, especially the thin bridges. The question now is to define the allowable fatigue limits for e-steel as a function of grade, thickness, etc. A particular case is that of motors used for e-mobility applications, where any fatigue damage to the rotor could modify the electromagnetic performance and mechanical integrity. This master’s thesis project is aimed at exploring the fatigue behavior of a set of non-oriented high silicon electrical steels. Since the materials are typically few 100 m thick, and of the order of the grain size, the experimental methods are challenging. The study may include material microstructure, test method development and data analysis to extract design curves. Details: • Period: Start Jan-Feb 2025 • 30 ECTS per student • Number of students: 1 • Location: On site ABB Corporate Research in Västerås, Sweden or Hybrid Your responsibilities: •A literature study on fatigue data and mechanisms of electric steel, as well as test methods for thin sheet specimens. • Identification of cases of interest to be investigated. • Planning and carrying out fatigue tests using appropriate test methods. • Identifying the failure mechanisms through advanced microscopy and/or other appropriate techniques. • Authoring a master’s thesis report, presentation of key findings, formulation of suggestions on subsequent investigations to perform.

Qualifications for the role

• Hands-on experience in material property testing
• Theoretical understanding and practical experience in fatigue testing
• Exposure to advanced microscopy such as Scanning Electron Microscopy
• Good collaboration capabilities in a research & development team.
• Strong team spirit and individual leadership to deliver expected results on time and with high quality

More about us
You are welcome to apply the latest by October 31st. Please note that selection will be done on an ongoing basis and the position may be filled before last day of application. We value people from different backgrounds. Could this be your story? Apply today or visit www.abb.com to read more about us and learn about the impact of our solutions across the globe. #MyABBStory #Li-onsite

Locations
Västerås, Sweden